This page explains how to structure your goals and tasks. Furthermore, details about the control of the program are provided.
All that is pending...
Now collect and structure important goals and tasks of your circles of influence. Record them in the outliner and subdivide them until each
entry is clear enough that you exactly know what to do.
And then go ahead. Solve the tasks. Achieve your goals.
The tree structure of objectives and tasks
If a task is too large, you should divide it into several small tasks. All that is unpleasant or obscure can be clarified by subdividing. A
simple to-do list is often not enough. Sub goals and tasks usually have a structure like a tree.
Now use meineZIELE to collect and
outline tasks and objectives.
New entries
The outline of a goal or a project consists of single lines, e.g. for individual tasks. There are several ways to insert new lines:
- When no entry is open, then you can add a line with the keyboard:
- Insert button
- Space bar
- Ctrl+N
- A click on a line will open it and an editing window will be shown. At the end of the open line there are two small red triangles. If you click these, you create new lines.
- A right click on an entry will open a context menu, which also includes the button for the creation of new lines.
- If an entry is open, you can also insert lines above or below by using the arrow keys.
Indenting lines
New lines you can move with the arrow keys to match the level of hierarchy:
Alternatively, drag the line with the mouse. If the Shift key is pressed simultaneously, sub entries will stay in their positions. A maximum of 8 levels is available. Entries can be moved horizontally and vertically at once.
By the way: The columns are marked by lines at the beginning of a new task collection. These lines disappear once you have collected some tasks.
How profound shall be subdivided?
Remember one of the most important principles of success: Goals are broken down so far that of each task is immediately clear how it shall be solved. Therefore nowhere shall remain uncertainty. Yet, nothing should be anticipated unnecessarily.
The result
Your result should probably look like in the screenshot to the right:
Even within the lower levels you should arrange the tasks by importance, at least roughly. The line colors can be graded in accordance with
your personal preferences. Go to the options menu to change the settings (Options -> Settings -> Colors).
Example
A simple example of a hierarchical task list can be found in the file menu in example 3.
Hiding lower levels
An increasing number of
entries can transform clarity to confusion again. Therefore, you can hide subordinate entries.
Right-click the triangle in front of the
line. The triangle turns from horizontal to vertical and the subtasks disappear. You will find the triangles only at lines with sub entries.
For advanced users: If you click the triangle with the left mouse button, all lower levels remain as they are and keep their configuration
(closed / open). This configuration is restored as you reopen the sub entries with a left click. A right click will open the following level
only. The next two levels can be opened with any mouse click (right or left) + Ctrl; all following levels can be opened with a mouse click +
Alt.
Adjusting lines
Entries can be moved to a different place of the outline with the mouse. Sub entries will be moved together. When you drag the entries to a different place, a blue triangle indicates the new place of the entries.
Reordering entries
Entries can be rearranged easily.
Each entry can simply be dragged to another with the mouse and will thus be inserted above. When
you drag any entry, two things will happen: Firstly, your curser will appear in shape of the entries that you are moving. Secondly, a mouse move
on the triangles that indicate hidden sub entries will make these visible. So you can choose another hierarchy level as well.
Editing entries
To edit an entry, click on the line and overwrite its text. An editing window will be shown. Its content depends on the learning stage. You can give entries individual colors (usually that makes only sense in the top level). In the options menu, you can adjust the color settings.
A source of motivation: Crossing out what is done
Not any guide on working methodology would miss the following
important advice: Once finished all tasks of a calendar sheet, do not just replace it. Instead, cross out each solved task immediately.
It is simple but effective: Any sense of achievement recharges our "batteries". We gain energy and keep motivated.
Crossing out and deleting entries
If the editing window is open, single lines can be deleted by clicking the delete button on screen with the mouse. If the editing window is closed, you can delete an entry with the delete key. Sub entries will be deleted as well.
If you still want to see
the tasks you have already solved: Cross out the solved tasks and achieved goals by clicking on the crossed "T" in the editing window. The line
will appear strikethrough, but remain at its place. When you do your daily review, delete the less important entries and take the essential ones
to your success collection.
This function can also be useful at the documentation of current projects.
Top tasks and additional functions
Click on a line to see the editing window. The red, upward-pointing arrow indicates an entry as a top task. The green arrow activates a task. For details, see the "today view". The remaining buttons are used to present an entry bold, italic, strikethrough and in individual color.
Select / Mark
With some functions such as sort, cut, or embolden you can edit several lines at the same time.
Marking a line is as follows:
a. Single entries are selected by clicking.
b. Click a line.
Press the Shift key and hold it. Click another line. All lines between will be marked, too.
Select entries with a selection box you drag
beginning left of the entries, as shown in the screenshot to the right.
If you prefer to work with the keyboard, hold the Shift key while
you select the lines with the arrow keys.
c. meineZIELE allows only meaningful selections. The range of selection stops automatically
when you reach an entry with a higher hierarchy level than the entry at which you have started the selection. If you mark an entry and only a
part of its sub entries, the selection will automatically be completed with the remaining sub entries. The selected entries appear highlighted.
Cut and Paste
Single or multiple lines can be processed with the buttons for cut, copy and paste.
Lines are added after
the currently open entry (open for editing or marked with a frame).
If there is no entry open, the well-known keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+C,
Ctrl+V, Ctrl+X) can be used.
Selected lines appear highlighted. The color can be adjusted in the options menu
(Options->Settings->colors). Yellow is set as default.
Move to a date
Occasionally, there are cases where a date shall be
assigned to an outline or a selection of entries. (As a rule, it is better to assign a date only to the respective parent entry.) If you drag a
selection of entries to a date in the calendar holding the Ctrl key, the chosen date will be assigned to these entries. Now there are two basic
cases:
a. If there has not been assigned any date to the entries yet, the chosen date will be assigned to each selected entry.
b. If the
first entry of the selection already contains a date, all the other dates will be shifted by the same number of days, since meineZIELE assumes
that a project is being postponed. Entries without a date will remain unchanged.
Sort
Selected rows can be sorted. That can be useful at a variety of lists, but usually not at the structuring process of objectives. An example: You create a list of books that you want to read someday. In the budget field, you enter the price. For author or language you could use free definable fields. That could look like this:
In the figure, all the lines of the list have already been selected, what you can see due to the yellow background color. Now, click on the
sorting icon (note the arrow in the screenshot) to sort the selected lines with regard to the desired column.
The order refers to the
highest level of the selected range. Any sub entries are moved together and arranged correctly, though. For example, if there are any
calculations from sub entries included in the budget column, these calculations will be considered if you sort by budget. All those columns by
which can be sorted will be marked. For example, sorting tasks by date is possible as well.
A second click on an already sorted column
turns the sort order.
Highlight in colors
Sometimes you want to highlight something colored, but sort by other criteria at the
same time. For example you could mark all lines concerning a certain team member with green color and sort the list by date at once. To stay at
our example with the book list, you may want to sort by author, but highlight all books in French language.
That
is done quickly:
Sort by language (1 click), choose the French titles (1 drag with the mouse), choose a color with the respective button once you have selected
all desired titles (3 clicks) and then sort again, by author (1 click). Like this, you have all French titles highlighted in a consecutive list.
Sorting is not very useful at goals and tasks, but a great help at lists.
Some shortkeys
An entry can be open (editing
window is shown) or closed (marked by a frame). In both cases shortcuts are available. They may have different results though:
Entry closed:
| Arrow key up/down | Move one line up/down |
| Arrow key up/down + Shift | Expand selection |
| Arrow key up/down + Ctrl | Move selection |
| Insert | Insert new line |
| Delete | Delete line |
| F1 | Help |
| F2 | Open entry |
| F11 | Switch between "Objectives" view and "Today" view |
| F12 | Go to details |
| Ctrl+V | Close/open sub tree |
| Arrow key left/right | Hierarchy left/right |
| Cntrl + Tab | Hierarchy left/right without sub tree |
Entry open:
| Tab | Move between culomns |
| Arrow key left/right + Shift | Hierarchy left/right (also without Shift if line is empty) |